NWA Owner Billy Corgan On Finding The 'Next Nick Aldis' For His Promotion

Since signing with WWE in late 2023, Nick Aldis has appeared as an onscreen authority figure in the promotion, where he currently portrays the "SmackDown" General Manager. Before this, Aldis was one of the biggest stars in NWA, and recently during an appearance on "Busted Open Radio," Billy Corgan – owner of the promotion – opened up about his quest to find the "next Nick Aldis" and face of NWA, as the current NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion is cut from a different cloth.

 "[NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion] EC3 is very much his own guy, you know what I mean?" Corgan asked. "And he doesn't sort of hold himself in the mold that Nick did in trying to sort of emulate past champions." When it came to Aldis' legacy, Corgan noted that he brought prestige back to the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship, largely due to how he emulated his own idols. 

"Nick of course, very much into Nick Bockwinkel and Brett Hart, those are two of his sort of idols that he emulated and he did a good job of sort of brining that prestige – at least the feeling of prestige – back to the title." In terms of finding his next big star, Corgan pointed out that his current roster is already stacked with young talent like Colby Corino, Carson Drake, and Tom Latimer, as well as returned veteran, Paul Burchill. However, Corgan instead wants to find the next "Ricky Steamboat" instead. 

"I really believe that the future of the NWA is not necessarily poaching a name that you might have heard of, but trying to find those names before anybody's heard of those names," Corgan concluded.

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Busted Open Radio" and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.